History of the MACI Project

In 1990, a study by Canada's Natural Sciences and Engineering
Research Council concluded that an advanced communication
and computation infrastructure was essential to the
future health of Canadian research and, indeed, the
Canadian economy.

Over the next decade, the infrastructure began to emerge.
Provincial and federal governments, educational institutions
and industry realized the importance of infrastructure
for an information society. A number of collaborative
efforts flourished to meet the needs of the expanding
knowledge-based economy.

MACI has been at the leading edge of these developments.
Initiated in 1997 by a group of researchers at the Universities
of Alberta and Calgary, it was among the first advanced
computational infrastructure projects launched
in Canada.

The first phase of MACI (MACI-1) established the foundation
infrastructure with a $2 million investment in core
computational and multimedia resources at the Universities
of Alberta and Calgary. These resources became fully
operational over the summer of 1998 and provided impressive
early results.

The second phase, called MACI-2, was then launched
to invest a further $18 million in advanced computing
infrastructure. The first portion of funding was confirmed
in November 1998, with a $4.36 million award from the
Province of Alberta's Intellectual Infrastructure Partnership
Program (IIPP). In June 1999, full funding for MAC-2
was in place when the Canada Foundation for Innovation
announced $5.8 million for MACI-2.. Investment by participating
universities and private industry brought the total
project value to $18 million over three years (1999-2002).

Plans are now being made for follow-on funding for
further expansion under MACI-3.